


Tighten Up

by ClockworkCourier



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Based on a Tumblr Post, M/M, Mindless Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-17
Updated: 2014-04-17
Packaged: 2018-01-19 17:06:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1477381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkCourier/pseuds/ClockworkCourier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eren was torn between bashing his own head into his desk or writing ‘I LOVE YOU’ on a piece of paper and smashing Armin’s head into that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tighten Up

**Author's Note:**

> Just some mindless fluffy Eremin goodness based on jearminarlert's text post:
> 
> I want an eremin fic where eren is the cute lovesick one and armin is the cute oblivious one
> 
> So here's the unbeta'd mass of cotton fluff that I produced from that. :D It was so fun to write, let me just say.

It wasn’t Eren’s fault that his chemistry lab partner was potentially the most adorable boy in existence. Eren had nothing to do with his genetics (thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Arlert), or his sleeper addiction to Maroon 5 that he thought no one knew about, or the way he doodled in the margins of their team notebook, or really anything that made Eren want to have an existential crisis right in the middle of class. That was all Armin’s doing, and it was _his_ fault that Eren had to whine to his sister first thing in the morning about it.  
  
“I mean, have you ever just _looked_ at him?” he stressed, doing a better job of swirling his cereal than eating it. “It’s like he’s... I don’t know! Just, okay, like I was setting up our lab and I was doing awful because I suck at chemistry, and I almost broke our beaker but he caught it and just laughed but not like, in a mean way? His _laugh_ , Mikasa! It was so--”  
  
Mikasa just looked at him over the top of the cereal box. “You’ve got it bad,” was all she said.  
  
He really did, and again, it wasn’t his fault.  
  
The thing was, he was Armin’s lab partner completely by accident. It wasn’t like both of them didn’t have friends, and in fact, their friends intermingled a lot. However, with the exception of Connie and Sasha, none of their friends were in chemistry with them. But it was still a surprise when Armin came up to his desk on the first lab day with his eyes cast down and his fingers tightly clutching at the strap of his messenger bag.  
  
“Um, you don’t have to if you don’t want to, but I was wondering if you want to be my lab partner? Everyone else either has a partner or asked me because they think I’ll let them copy, but I didn’t think you would do that,” he said, his voice low and almost embarrassed.  
  
If Eren knew it would be the beginning of his end, he probably would have said yes anyway. Armin looked like a lost puppy and yeah, it would have been cruelty to say no.  
  
But it did, in fact, start Eren’s absolute mental unraveling every single time Armin did something slightly cute, or things that Eren just perceived as cute. Like a normal person might have thought that the way he lit a Bunsen burner was nothing remarkable, but Eren thought it was ridiculously cute the way he tweaked it _just_ right, or how he always got the spark to light it on the first try. By the time it finally struck Eren that maybe he was a little head-over-heels, it was too late.  
  
The problem was that there were certain things that Armin didn’t catch on to until they hit him like a freight train. He was amazingly logical, the absolute pinnacle of problem solvers, and the most avid reader Eren had ever met. However, while not socially inept in the least, there were quite a few cues he tended to miss completely, and then marvel over the fact he didn’t see them when it was pointed out to him.  
  
For instance, when Franz and Hannah started dating, Armin was the only person who was astounded. Everyone else was groaning and rolling their eyes whenever the couple would give each other _that_ look.  
  
So, it was pretty inevitable that he would have no idea that Eren was now the lost puppy type and everyone else knew.  
  
Mikasa, naturally, was the first to know, they way she knew just about everything Eren was thinking in that weird sister-psychic way she had. Then, it was Jean, who told Ymir, who let everyone at their lunch table know. Armin was the only one who didn’t hear, since he spent some of his lunches with members of the science club or his trivia team.  
  
Of course, with that, his friend group became a dating advice column in a matter of minutes.  
  
“You should take him to the science center,” Jean said with a smile that Eren just wanted to punch right off of his face. “You two can hold hands in the romantic light of a Van de Graaff generator.”  
  
“Or maybe just dinner. That’s always a good idea,” Christa quietly added. Ymir put her arm around Christa’s shoulders and added, “Or I can take Christa to dinner because _that_ is always a good idea.”  
  
Marco, as usual, was one of the wisest people there, saying, “Maybe you should just start by telling him how you feel.”  
  
“Yeah, Arlert can be kind of... oh, what’s the word...” Reiner said, crossing his arms over his chest and looking up at the ceiling lights.  
  
Eren had his head buried in his arms, trying in vain to hide the terrible traitorous blush on his face. “Oblivious?” he mumbled into his shirt sleeve.  
  
“There we go! Oblivious!”  
  
There was a mutter of agreement around the table.  
  
“Yeah, you’re going to have to be more upfront,” Jean said, reaching over and stealing a french fry from Marco’s plate. Naturally, Marco didn’t seem to mind. “If you keep getting all blushy and weird in front of him, he’s not going to take a hint. Hell, you could probably leave a massive bouquet on his desk and he still wouldn’t get it.”  
  
“I don’t think he’s _that_ oblivious,” Christa said.  
  
He _was_ , though. Eren wanted to think he could take a hint, but it became obvious when Eren’s game plan went something along the lines of ‘drop hints until you pass out from overexertion rather than voice your feelings’.  
  
First he tried the whole long and meaningful stare thing while Armin was working through some stoichiometry problems. It wasn’t something Eren tired of, for that matter. In fact, he was having a wonderful time admiring how the sunshine caught Armin’s hair just right and made it flaxen gold like some cliche from a fairy princess story. He also liked how a piece of it curled just right under Armin’s right ear. He was mentally working on a metaphor to describe the length of Armin’s eyelashes when said subject looked at him in alarm.  
  
“Is something wrong?”  
  
Eren shook his head and fought back a grin. “Nope. Not a thing.”  
  
“Are you sure? I mean, I had sharpie on my cheek earlier and I was wondering if I got it all,” Armin said, sounding exasperated.  
  
Of course he would be worried over something like that. Cue another shot straight to Eren’s heart.  
  
“Nah, just looking at your hair. It’s uh... really shiny.”

_Way to go, Jaeger,_ he scolded himself. _He’s not a Pokemon! There are better words than ‘shiny’!_  
  
Thankfully, Armin took it as the awkward compliment it was meant to be. He tucked some of his hair behind his ear, fortunately not moving the curl below it. “Oh, thank you,” he said, looking down at his worksheet like it was the most interesting thing in the world. Eren expected maybe some kind of cute blush, or a comment in return. Instead, he got, “I bought this new shampoo, so I guess it’s working?”  
  
Freight train, indeed.  
  
\---  
  
Attempted Number Two was a little less subtle. Eren took a sort of Jean-ish route and mustered up every ounce of courage in him before he sat down at their lab table.  
  
“So, _Armin_ ,” he said, drawing out his name.  
  
Armin looked up at him with a (ridiculously cute _oh my god can he stop being this adorable)_ smile. “Hm?”  
  
Eren tried to make the suavest grin in his repertoire of grins. Instead, he felt like he looked like he was trying to pass a kidney stone. “New Captain America movie just came out. Wanna see it?”  
  
The way Armin’s entire expression lit up made it completely worth it. “Absolutely!”  
  
Might as well keep the ball rolling. “Dinner before?”  
  
“Mmhmm!”  
  
Eren wanted to say something like ‘it’s a date’, but he was seriously trying to go for subtle. Instead, he gave Armin a thumbs up before the lecture began, but it was hard to keep his eyes off the (sunshine pales in comparison) smile on Armin’s face.  
  
\---  
  
Naturally, it sailed right over Armin’s head. Not only did he talk about his trivia team’s latest victory through most of their dinner (and Eren might have lost some points for taking him to a coney island rather than something like Olive Garden), but he also steered the conversation toward animal conservation and the importance of rainforest protection, for some reason. Any chance that Eren had to say he liked Armin was promptly replaced by a short list of critically endangered birds.  
  
Still, it was kind of nice to see Armin so enthusiastic about something. Even though most of the time, Eren had to pretend to be enthralled with the acidity of the Amazon River or how Mina Carolina scored the critical point in their last trivia competition, he still made mental notes of everything Armin enjoyed, or how passionate he was.  
  
The movie went as expected, other than the fact that Eren was itching to put his arm around Armin’s shoulders or hold his hand or _something_. Instead, he quietly watched the movie while hearing Armin gasp once in awhile, or whisper some little known fact about the comic books. Again, adorable enthusiasm, but with less of Eren kissing the daylights out of the boy next to him. Not so great.  
  
The car ride home was full of Armin comparing and contrasting the movie to the comics, or outlining his ideas about Captain America’s actual character.  
  
“I mean, to be displaced in _time!_ Like, I can’t imagine that. But it says something for him that he’s so willing and able to adjust even with things so hectic and the connectivity of the world making everything he knew either turned completely around or erased in its entirety!” Armin explained, his hand gestures going a mile a minute. “Which I suppose it’s good that he joined the Avengers since a few of them are in a similar situation, although not exactly so much time as maybe... spatial differences? Societal? Not to say his isn’t a societal difference as well, but not exactly like the Hulk or Thor.”  
  
“You’ve put a lot of thought into this,” Eren added with a laugh as he pulled into Armin’s driveway.  
  
In the dark, if Armin had blushed, Eren wouldn’t have been able to see it. However, he did duck his head down slightly. “Sorry,” he said with a smile. “I usually read comics in between class or when we go to trivia tournaments. I finished the entire Hawkeye series when we went to the Science Olympiad.”  
  
“No, it’s not a bad thing!” Eren exclaimed, putting the car into park. He looked over at Armin who was giving him an appreciative grin in return.  
  
“Most people just call me a nerd and get on with it,” Armin added coyly.  
  
Eren playfully nudged him in the shoulder. “Okay, _nerd_. Feel better?”  
  
“Much,” he said cheerfully.  
  
They laughed, and Eren belatedly realized that it would have been an opportune time to say something or go the full length of it and lean over and kiss Armin. The second the thought hit him, Armin was unbuckling his seat belt.  
  
“It was fun!” he said, opening the car door. “I’ll see you in class tomorrow, okay?”  
  
“Oh, uh, yeah!” was Eren’s eloquent answer.  
  
And thus, Armin closed the door, gave Eren a quick wave, and went into his house. Once more, Eren had to sit and marvel at the fact that Armin was so completely out of the loop, and Eren was in even more trouble of becoming stupidly in love with him.  
  
\---  
  
The third time was the charm, Eren thought. Buying things seemed to be a pretty good way of wooing someone in some form. A Captain America shirt wasn’t a bouquet, so Eren liked to think that Jean’s theory wasn’t going to be proven. Besides, roses were expensive (not that Eren checked or anything) and a little overdone. A t-shirt seemed like just the right thing, and there was the possibility of sending the signal of, ‘Hey! I like you enough to remember the things you like and here you go!’  
  
Eren even got to class early to set the t-shirt on Armin’s desk before taking his own seat and eagerly waiting for Armin to get there.  
  
When he did, Armin smiled and picked up the t-shirt, admiring it. For some reason, Eren expected some fanfare; harps, little naked baby cherubs, sparkles, fountains with champagne bursting out of the floor like alcoholic geysers. However, he got Armin giving him a very earnest, “Thank you!” before sliding the t-shirt over the shirt he was wearing.  
  
Then he sat down and took out his notebook.  
  
That was it.  
  
Eren was torn between bashing his own head into his desk or writing ‘I LOVE YOU’ on a piece of paper and smashing Armin’s head into that.  
  
\---  
  
At a complete lack for ideas, Eren turned to Mikasa once more on their drive to school. They lived ten minutes away, so there was plenty of time to talk about it.  
  
“He just doesn’t get it! I mean, I don’t want to push it because maybe he’s not interested and I don’t want to make him do anything he doesn’t want!” he explained, gripping the straps on his backpack like a lifeline.  
  
“Pretty considerate of you,” Mikasa answered, sounding like she was already beyond bored with the conversation. Eren guessed it was because she just wanted him to get it over with.  
  
“So what should I do?”  
  
“Just tell him,” she said automatically.  
  
He frowned, picking at a loose stitch on one of the straps. “Yeah, but what if he freaks out and doesn’t want to be friends anymore? That would suck even worse.”  
  
She stopped at a red light and sighed, finally looking over at her brother. “Eren, do you want my honest opinion?”  
  
He nodded.  
  
“Tell him straight up. No frills. No subtleties. Just tell him how you feel.”  
  
The way she said it left no room for argument or retort, and as the light changed to green, Eren sank down in his chair and stared at the dashboard sullenly. He normally wasn’t the subtle type, and he had a habit of being a bit brash and impulsive at times. For some reason, that all drained away when Armin was around. It was ridiculous, and as much as he didn’t want to admit that any of his friends were right about Armin, he figured that now the only way to do things was to make it as clear as crystal. He was impulsive, and Armin was oblivious. There really was only one way to do it.  
  
\---  
  
Maybe throwing down the ultimate admission of love wasn’t advisable in the middle of a lab about sniffing cotton balls. Granted, Eren didn’t _know_ they were going to be sniffing cotton balls, but there he was, complete with safety goggles and a very tasteful bright green apron, his head under a fume hood while Armin cringed and set a tupperware container down. “Smells like locker room,” he said, quickly jotting his results down.  
  
Where the segue was eluded Eren completely, but recording the terrible scents of cotton seemed to be as good a time as any.  
  
“Hey Armin?”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
Eren took in a deep (lemon-scented?) breath through his nose before saying, “I like you.”  
  
Armin paused halfway through a word and looked up, his eyes wide behind his massive plastic goggled. “Huh?”  
  
Eren felt heat rising to his face at an astounding rate. “I, uh... I _like_ like you.”  
  
 _What is this, kindergarten?_ he thought.  
  
“You...”  
  
 _Force of a freight train, Jaeger. Pull into the station or derail._  
  
“Okay, no. I _love_ you. That better?”  
  
There was a beat of silence between them before Armin’s eyebrows practically ascended into his hairline. “Do you need to stick your head back in the fume hood? You sound anoxic.”  
  
“No! No, I’m not anoxic. I’m telling you the truth.”  
  
They stood there for so long that they didn’t notice that it was time to rotate stations until the next group came up behind them and someone cleared their throat. Eren nervously trailed after Armin to the next stop, but neither of them made the move to open up the container. Armin just sort of stared at it like opening it would also reveal every known secret in the universe.  
  
“So,” he started, getting that look like he was _really_ thinking. “You... love me?”  
  
“That’s what I said, yeah,” Eren replied. He couldn’t help but feel like it should have been going better.  
  
“Is this a new thing?”  
  
“...Huh?”  
  
Armin looked up at Eren with legitimate thoughtfulness. “Like did you just start feeling like this?”  
  
Oh God, he was serious. There was no freight train that would have made him aware. It would have to take a 747 to get anything through. “Armin, the _staring_ thing? The _movie_? The _shirt?_ Is none of this clicking?”  
  
“I thought...” Armin’s eyes went wide again and he mouthed a silent ‘oh’. “That was... _ohhh_.”  
  
“You didn’t catch on?”  
  
“I thought you were being really friendly.”  
  
“Kind of, yeah!” Eren was blushing again, seconds away from stammering. His hands clenched at the corner of the countertop to steady himself.  
  
He didn’t expect one of Armin’s hands to cover his own, and he looked up to see Armin _finally_ blushing, grinning like he just couldn’t smile wide enough. “I got it,” was all he said.  
  
\---  
  
Eren didn’t know that his friends had placed bets on how long it would take him and Armin to hook up. He especially didn’t know that Jean and Mikasa had won the bet.  
  
He _did_ know, however, that Armin was the kind of person who mixed at least four flavors into a 7Eleven Slurpee, and that he could do this Bruce Lee kind of trick with balancing coins on his elbow before quickly putting his arm down and catching them in midair, and that for never having dated a day in his life, he was a _really_ good kisser. Not like anyone else needed to know that, though.  
  
The best part was that they fit together perfectly. Impulsive and brash with calm and logical. Oblivious and aware. And it made it all worth the existential crises and complaining to Mikasa and being absolutely mindlessly lovestruck over the perfect boy in Eren’s chemistry class.


End file.
